The wing tip of a Quad City Challenger II, formed with an aluminum bow

The wing tip of an American Aviation AA-1 Yankee, showing its Hoerner style design

The wing tip is that part of the wing most distant from the fuselage of a fixed-wing aircraft.

Because the wing tip shape influences the size and drag of the wing tip vortices, how best to terminate the wing of an airplane has long been a controversial subject amongst aircraft designers. As a result of this diversity of opinion wing tips are seen with many different configurations, including: Wingtip vortices stream from an F-15 as it disengages from a KC-10 Extender following midair refueling. ...

• Squared-off
• Aluminium tube bow
• Rounded
• Hoerner style
• Winglets

Wing tips are also an expression of aircraft design styling and so their shape may be influenced by as much by marketing considerations as aerodynamic requirements. Traditionally, Marketing has been a term applied to the craft of linking the producers (or potential producers) of a product or service with customers, both existing and potential. ... Aerodynamics is a branch of fluid dynamics concerned with the study of gas flows, first analysed by George Cayley in the 1800s. ...

Wing tips are often used by aircraft designers to mount navigation lights, anti-collision strobe lights and for other utility purposes. A Navigation Light is a colored source of specular illumination (a point source) on an aircraft, water-borne vessel, or land vehicle. ...

The opposite end of a wing from the wing tip is the wing root. The wing root of a simple aircraft, an American Aviation AA-1 Yankee, showing a wing root fairing The wing root is that part of the wing, on a fixed-wing aircraft, that is closest to the fuselage. ...